KTH in Stockholm is the largest and oldest technical university in Sweden. No less than one-third of Sweden’s technical research and engineering education capacity at university level is provided by KTH. Education and research spans from natural sciences to all branches of engineering and includes architecture, industrial management and urban planning. There are a total of just over 15,000 first and second level students and more than 1,600 doctoral students. KTH has almost 4,300 employees.

KTH Computer Science and Communication is Sweden’s leading research and education institution in Information Technology, with activities at both KTH and Stockholm University. The activities of the school focus on higher education and research within the traditional core areas of numerical analysis and computer science; from theory building and analysis of mathematical models to algorithm construction, implementation and simulation. Other core areas of growing importance are technology and methods for the support of human communication and computer mediated cooperation. The applied research includes scientific computing, computer science, computer vision, robotics, neuroinformatics and neural networks, human-computer interaction, media technology, and communication through speech and music. For more information, go to www.kth.se/csc and follow the link to our "international website”.

The position will be placed at the department of Media Technology and Interaction Design at the CSC School. The student will work in a new research group currently being established by Professor Kristina Höök. Kristina Höök will be the supervisor of the studies.

Assignment

Today, we see a world taking shape were all things get connected to the internet (IoT). In this Internet of Things world there will always be an end-user who is interacting – more or less directly – with all these networked devices. The devices in the Internet of Things may be accessed in different ways. One is through the cloud where the things are connected to services, another possibility is through direct interaction on the object itself. With the increasing thing-ness of the interaction surfaces offered, we will see new interaction modalities, such as sound, touch and motion – which is what we are interested in here.

It is of key importance that we can create technology and design applications that address deeply human ways of living in this IoT-world: addressing body, emotion, sociality and empathy.

The research will be design-driven, developed in a tight user-centered design loop involving users at all stages. The aim is to bring out new strong design concepts taking full advantage of the Internet of Things design material.

This is a four-year time-limited position that can be extended up to a year with the inclusion of a maximum of 20% departmental duties, usually teaching. Doctoral students must be registered at KTH. The starting date is open for discussion, though ideally we would like the successful candidate to start 1st of April.

Employment

Form of employment: Time-limited
Work time: Full time
The salary follows the directions provided by KTH
Start date: According to agreement
Number of positions: 1

Qualifications

A suitable background for this position would be a Master’s Degree in Engineering with a specialisation in Interaction Design or Human-Computer Interaction, alternatively a Master of Arts degree from an Industrial Design school, specialising in Interaction Design. In addition to the traditional academic merits with a strong degree project, deep personal interests in engaging with technologies such as sensors, radio communication or actuators combined with a genuine interest in what is deeply meaningful and valuable to people are regared as advantageous qualitifications.

Applicants must be strongly motivated for doctoral studies, possess the ability to work independently and perform critical analysis as well as possessing good levels of cooperative and communicative abilities.

Application

Application deadline: March 5, 2012
Employer's reference: D-2012-0038

Applications via email are to be sent to: susanneb@csc.kth.se  
Write reference number in the email subject. (CV, etc. should be sent as an attachment, as pdf-files.)

We also accept hard copy applications sent to:
KTH, CSC
Att. Susanne Bergman,
Lindstedtsvägen 3, 4th floor,
SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden

Application shall include the following documents:

1. Curriculum vitae, including links/descriptions of previously conducted interaction design projects that may be relevant to the position
2. Transcripts of degrees from university/university college
3. Brief description of why the applicant wishes to become a doctoral student in this area

Please observe that all material needs to be in English, apart from the official document.

We are currently gathering information to help improve our recruitment process. We would, therefore, be very grateful if you could include an answer to the following question within your application: Where did you initially come across this job advertisement?

Contact(s)

For enquiries about Ph.D studies and employment conditions please contact:
Eva-Lena Åkerman, HR Manager
Phone: +46 8 790 91 06
ela@csc.kth.se

For enquiries about the project please contact:
Kristina Höök, professor
Phone: +46 8 561 70 35
kia.hook@gmail.com              

Union representative

Lars Abrahamsson, SACO
Phone: +46 8 790 70 58
lars.abrahamsson@ee.kth.se